Hundreds of demonstrators flooded the streets of Milan on Saturday, voicing strong opposition to the planned deployment of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents for the upcoming 2026 Winter Olympics. The agents are set to support and secure the American delegation, headed by Vice President JD Vance, amid growing concerns and frustration throughout Italy.
Details of the Anti-ICE Rally
At least 1,000 people assembled in the bustling Piazza XXV Aprile in central Milan for a spontaneous rally coordinated by center-left political groups and labor unions. Participants blew whistles—a gesture echoing the resistance movement in Minneapolis following the tragic deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti. Protesters waved placards with witty slogans like “ICE only in the spritz,” “ICE? No, grazie,” “The only ICE we want in Milan is the one under the skates,” and “With ICE, we make granita.” Loudspeakers blasted Bruce Springsteen’s recent track “Streets of Minneapolis,” inspired by President Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration policies.
This gathering highlights a broader wave of discontent in Italy over reports that ICE personnel will travel to the Milano-Cortina 2026 Games to assess and counter threats from international crime networks. Early announcements lacked specifics on their duties, fueling worries that the agents might target Italian residents similarly to their actions depicted in viral videos and news coverage.
Local Leaders Respond
Milan’s Mayor Giuseppe Sala, whose city will host the opening ceremony along with events like figure skating and ice hockey, firmly stated that the ICE agents are “not welcome.” He described them as “a militia that kills, a militia that enters into the homes of people, signing their own permission slips.”
Subsequent updates clarified that Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), an ICE division, will operate from a command center at the U.S. consulate in a purely advisory capacity. The team in Italy differs from those handling domestic U.S. immigration enforcement. Such support from ICE at global sporting events, including past Olympics, is standard practice.
Still, the fierce reaction underscores heightened global scrutiny of ICE operations and the anti-American feelings stirred by certain enforcement tactics.
Political and Community Perspectives
Alessandro Capelli, secretary of the Milan branch of Italy’s Democratic Party—the primary opposition to Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s administration—emphasized the event’s global significance. “We know that today, a lot of people in the world are looking at us, because we are hosting the Olympic Games. It’s not just a sporting event, it’s important for all the world,” he said. “We would like to say that the fight for human rights all over the world, it’s our fight too. We are citizens of Milan, we are citizens of the world. We are watching on TV what ICE is doing in the U.S., so for us it’s quite a normal thing to show our solidarity with people who are fighting.”
Capelli noted varied responses across Italy’s political landscape: “Obviously, the democratic and left part are moving with more courage, while people in the right say something like, for example: ‘We don’t like a lot the method of ICE.’ But we have a problem: Steve Bannon is a friend of Giorgia Meloni and Matteo Salvini, so they have to explain to us how this friendship is going.”
Jocelyn Frederick, a U.S. expatriate from Florida who has resided in Italy for nearly two decades, questioned the choice to highlight ICE over broader Homeland Security involvement. “We’re used to hearing about Homeland Security being involved in major international events,” she explained. “We hear about that happening, and especially for anti-terrorism, but that they would be using the ICE, it sounds like it’s a show of force: ‘We’re bringing our agents. We’re showing that they are strictly connected to [JD] Vance and the administration.’ Like, they’re coming with him. That’s what doesn’t really make sense.”
She added that public opinion in Italy is divided, with most contacts expressing dismay over U.S. developments. “Some people will say, ‘We need ICE here too,’ and then there’s other people who are just very clearly very against it. The majority of people who I speak to are very upset about what’s going on in America in general.”
